Airship

In 1709 he presented a petition to King John V of Portugal,
seeking royal favour for his invention of an airship, in which he
expressed the greatest confidence. The contents of this petition have
been preserved, together with a picture and description of his airship. Developing the ideas of Francesco Lana de Terzi,
S.J., Gusmão wanted to spread a huge sail over a boat-like body like
the cover of a transport wagon; the boat itself was to contain tubes
through which, when there was no wind, air would be blown into the sail
by means of bellows. The vessel was to be propelled by the agency of
magnets which were to be encased in two hollow metal balls. The public
test of the machine, which was set for June 24, 1709, did not take
place.

Passarola, Bartolomeu de Gusmão’s airship

It is known that Gusmão was working on this principle at the public
exhibition he gave before the Court on August 8, 1709, in the hall of
the Casa da Índia
in Lisbon, when he propelled a ball to the roof by combustion. The king
rewarded the inventor by appointing him to a professorship at Coimbra and made him a canon. He was also one of the fifty selected as members of the Academia Real de História,
founded in 1720; and in 1722 he was made chaplain to the Court. Gusmão
also busied himself with other inventions, but in the meantime continued
his work on his airship schemes, the idea for which he is said to have
conceived while a novice at Bahia. His designs included a ship to sail in the air consisting of a triangular gas-filled pyramid, but he died without making progress.

Persecution

One account of Gusmão's work suggests that the Portuguese Inquisition
forbade him to continue his aeronautic investigations and persecuted
him because of them, but this is probably a later invention. It dates
however from at least the end of the 18th century, as the following
article in the London Daily Universal Register(later The Times) of October 20, 1786, makes clear:

"By accounts from Lisbon we are assured, that in consequence of the experiments made there with the Montgolfier
balloon, the literati of Portugal had been incited to make numerous
researches on the subject; in consequence of which they pretend that the
honour of the invention is due to Portugal. They say that in 1720, a
Brazilian Jesuit, named Bartholomew Gusmao, possessed of abilities,
imagination, and address, by permission of John V. fabricated a balloon
in a place contiguous to the Royal Palace, and one day, in presence of
their Majesties, and an immense crowd of spectators, raised himself, by
means of a fire lighted in the machine, as high as the cornice of the
building; but through the negligence and want of experience of those who
held the cords, the machine took an oblique direction, and, touching
the cornice, burst and fell.

The balloon was in the form of a bird with a tail and wings. The
inventor proposed to make new experiments, but, chagrined at the
raillery of the common people, who called him wizzard, and terrified by
the Inquisition, he took the advice of his friends, burned his
manuscripts, disguised himself, and fled to Spain, where he soon after
died in an hospital.

They add, that several learned men, French and English, who had been
at Lisbon to verify the fact, had made enquiries at the Carmelite
monastery, where Gusmao had a brother, who had preserved some of his
manuscripts on the manner of constructing aerostatic machines. Various
living persons affirm that they were present at the Jesuit's
experiments, and that he received the surname of Voador, or Flying-man."

Contemporary documents do attest that information was laid before the
Inquisition against Gusmão, but on quite another charge. The inventor
fled to Spain and fell ill of a fever, of which he died in Toledo. He wrote: Manifesto summário para os que ignoram poderse navegar pelo elemento do ar (Short Manifesto for those who are unaware that is possible to sail through the element air, 1709); and Vários modos de esgotar sem gente as naus que fazem água (Several ways of draining, without people, ships that leak water, 1710); some of his sermons also have been printed.

Hot air balloon

The hot air balloon is the first successful human-carrying flight technology. The first untethered manned hot air balloon flight was performed by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d'Arlandes on November 21, 1783, in Paris, France,[1] in a balloon created by the Montgolfier brothers.[2]
The first hot-air balloon flown in the United States was launched from
the Walnut Street Jail in Philadelphia on January 9, 1793 by the French
aeronaut Jean Pierre Blanchard.[3] Hot air balloons that can be propelled through the air rather than simply drifting with the wind are known as thermal airships.
A hot air balloon consists of a bag called the envelope that is capable of containing heated air. Suspended beneath is a gondola or wicker basket (in some long-distance or high-altitude balloons, a capsule),
which carries passengers and (usually) a source of heat, in most cases
an open flame. The heated air inside the envelope makes it buoyant since it has a lower density than the relatively cold air outside the envelope. As with all aircraft, hot air balloons cannot fly beyond the atmosphere. Unlike gas balloons,
the envelope does not have to be sealed at the bottom since the air
near the bottom of the envelope is at the same pressure as the air
surrounding. For modern sport balloons, the envelope is generally made
from nylon fabric and the inlet of the balloon (closest to the burner flame) is made from fire resistant material such as Nomex.
Beginning during the mid-1970s, balloon envelopes have been made in all
kinds of shapes, such as rocket ships and the shapes of various
commercial products, though the traditional shape remains popular for
most non-commercial, and many commercial, applications.